Ray City History Blog

A sad Berrien County scene was the execution of Seaborn Lastinger for desertion from the Confederate States Army.

Civil War deserter executed by firing squad.

Seaborn Lastinger was one of the early settlers of Old Berrien, arriving before 1830, before Berrien even was a county. He was  enumerated in the 1830 Census as a head of  household Lowndes County, GA. He was a brother of William Lastinger, who owned the Stoney Hill plantation and the Lastinger Mill at Milltown (now Lakeland), GA and who before the Civil War “was the largest landholder, the largest slaveholder, and the largest taxpayer in Berrien and Lowndes counties.“

Seaborn Lastinger was the husband of Elender Driggers Lastinger, and father of Nancy Lastinger, Mary Lastinger, Ellen Lastinger, Sarah Lastinger, William Lastinger, and Susan Lastinger. According to the history of the John Lastinger Family of America, he was a soldier in the Confederate States Army. During the Civil War, he left his unit without permission and came home to Berrien County.

Taking “French leave,” or going absent without leave, was not uncommon among Confederate soldiers (see J. D. Evans was Skulking and Hiding Out, Elbert J. Chapman Was A Victim of Military Discipline, Albert Douglass: Soldier Grey and Sailor Blue) Rewards were offered for deserters. Companies sent men to hunt them down. Throughout the war, the penalty for being absent without leave ranged widely. The penalty might be as lenient as amnesty, a stern lecture, extra duty, confinement to tent, or loss of rank. But some men were executed. Widows of men executed for desertion would later be denied a pension.

The execution of Seaborn Lastinger made an indelible impression on his  six-year-old niece, Nebraska Lastinger, daughter of William Lastinger.  In a letter written from Nashville, GA seventy years after the event she described the scene.  Her narrative suggests the family and perhaps she herself witnessed the execution.

Nebraska Lastinger wrote about the execution of her uncle Seaborn Lastinger during the Civil War.

“I will try to explain what Detail meant.  During the Civil War the soldiers would come home without furlow; they were called deserters.  The Details were a Company of men too old to serve in the army.  Their duty was to find deserters and send them back to the army.  For a deserter’s third offence he was to be shot by a squad of the details appointed by the higher officers.

Uncle Seaborn was shot at sunrise.  He was blindfolded standing on his knees by a large pine tree.  My father took it hard, and recorded it in his record this way: (Shot by those damned men called Details).”

The execution apparently occurred about 1863, but no official record of Seaborn’s military unit or service has been forthcoming.  What became of his family is not known.

Related Posts:

• William Lastinger Family Reunions started at Cat Creek
• L.E. Lastinger and Captain Knight’s Berrien Minutemen
• Joshua Berrien Lastinger
• Elbert J. Chapman Was A Victim of Military Discipline
• Captain J. D. Evans was Skulking and Hiding Out
• Old Yaller’s Widow Was Denied Pension